Hot Take: The Media Eats Crow as Lab Leak Theory Becomes Widely Accepted

Remember the days of the pandemic, the one that supposedly started with a bat at a wet market and snowballed into businesses being shut down and people locked in their homes? Well it turns out the origin theory that the media refused to acknowledge, and some even called kooky and racist, turns out to be the likeliest explanation after all.

“A prominent scientist who worked on coronavirus projects funded by the U.S. government is one of three Chinese researchers who became sick with an unspecified illness during the initial outbreak of Covid-19, according to current and former U.S. officials,” a story by the Wall Street Journal this week reads.

You mean to tell me that scientists operating novel coronavirus experiments in Wuhan itself could have had something to do with the outbreak that short circuited the whole world?

But I was told by the New York Times’ infectious disease journalist it was wrong to mention that as a viable theory!

“Someday we will stop talking about the lab leak theory and maybe even admit its racist roots. But alas, that day is not yet here,” Apoorva Mandavilli tweeted in May 2021.

Forbes ran a headline that read, “The Wuhan Lab Leak Hypothesis Is A Conspiracy Theory, Not Science.”

The Washington Post’s lead “fact checker,” Glenn Kessler, said “it is virtually impossible for this virus to jump from the lab.”

The Times called it a “fringe theory.”

Now, they’re all eating a MASSIVE helping of crow. 

This kind of condescending dismissal of very valid theories was plentiful during the pandemic. Anything that didn’t toe the liberal media’s line was considered fringe or a conspiracy. Remember when a bunch of scientists signed the “Great Barrington Declaration” that suggested reaching herd immunity from COVID-19 should be the goal for public health policy?

It stated, “The most compassionate approach that balances the risks and benefits of reaching herd immunity, is to allow those who are at minimal risk of death to live their lives normally to build up immunity to the virus through natural infection, while better protecting those who are at highest risk.”

Then the liberal media broadly painted this statement — which touted the importance of A LITERALLY CENTURIES OLD PUBLIC HEALTH THEORY used successfully on countless diseases and viruses — as “fringe.”

Patently absurd.

They did the same thing with treatment theories of COVID-19, whether it was Dr. Robin Armstrong’s use of hydroxychloroquine, Dr. Richard Bartlett’s use of budesonide, an asthma medication, or Dr. Mary Bowden’s use of ivermectin. ALL these doctors were successful in treating the symptoms of the coronavirus and each were scoffed at or outrightly condemned.

The Texan, however, covered each of these doctors’ innovative treatments, along with many other examples while the legacy media ignored or insulted them.

You know why? Because we, at The Texan, believe you should be given information – regardless of your politics so you can make informed decisions for yourself. 

And guess what? It turns out these doctors were right. The Great Barrington Declaration was right. And the lab leak theory is a very strong possibility, if not entirely confirmed at this point.

At each of those turns, however, legacy media wrongly suppressed these stories and thus kept the public in the dark regarding successful, life saving treatments. They neglected their responsibility as journalists to inquire, investigate, and provide facts – regardless of their own personal bias. Instead, the media dismissed them out of hand and individuals paid the ultimate price because of it.